Vice President of Operational Excellence

Role Overview

The Vice President of Operational Excellence plays a pivotal executive role in refining and elevating the company's operational management systems. This position holds comprehensive responsibility for crafting and executing strategies around operational excellence, reengineering core business processes, and driving lean methodologies alongside cross-departmental efficiency enhancements.

Key Responsibilities

• Develop the company’s strategic direction and medium-to-long-term roadmap for operational excellence.
• Transition the operational management framework from a reliance on experience towards standardized, process-oriented, and data-driven approaches.
• Ensure the operational excellence initiatives align thoroughly with the overarching business goals.
• Lead the redesign and optimization of fundamental business processes through Business Process Reengineering (BPR).
• Implement continuous improvement practices such as Lean, Six Sigma, and Kaizen to eradicate waste and boost operational efficiency, effectiveness, and delivery standards.
• Set up company-wide cost optimization mechanisms to enhance resource allocation and operational efficiency, reduce costs, and improve profit margins and asset utilization.
• Create and maintain unified operational standards and quality management systems, enforce Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs), and propagate best practices to stabilize organizational delivery and elevate customer satisfaction.
• Champion the rollout of digital operational solutions including ERP, MES, and BI platforms, establish critical operational KPIs, and use data analytics for informed decision-making and ongoing improvements.
• Facilitate cross-functional cooperation among departments such as Production, Supply Chain, Sales, Finance, and HR, and lead enterprise-wide operational project management offices or operational excellence teams.
• Guide major change management initiatives and strategic operational projects to support the company’s transformation objectives.
• Assemble and nurture a high-performing team focused on operational excellence, fostering expertise in lean management and continuous improvement methods.
• Promote a culture of operational excellence across the organization, encouraging broad participation and ownership.

Qualifications

• Educational background including a Bachelor’s degree or higher in Industrial Engineering, Operations Management, Business Administration, or related disciplines.
• MBA and professional certifications such as Lean/Six Sigma Black Belt are preferred.
• Extensive operational experience exceeding 20 years with at least 15 years in executive leadership roles.
• Demonstrated success in implementing operational excellence frameworks in large-scale organizations.
• Expertise in operational system design, process optimization, lean management, cost control, and cross-functional leadership.

Preferred Background

• Experience in manufacturing, supply chain, or large service enterprises.
• Global operations or multi-regional management background.
• Exposure to digital transformation and smart manufacturing projects.
• Proven ability managing enterprise-level PMOs or operations transformation offices.